


Real is a Thing that Happens to You

by nervoussis



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Billy Hargrove Needs a Hug, Childhood Memories, M/M, Post-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-24
Updated: 2020-11-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:55:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27665732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nervoussis/pseuds/nervoussis
Summary: Billy doesn't remember a time when he longed for the sanctity of his bedroom. For the pale yellow sunlight streaming past blood stained Thomas the Train curtains, or the box of broken toys that Neil had left alone. He doesn't remember when it happened, when the flip switched and his longing went from missing Saturday morning cartoons in his parents bed to simply missing his mother and all the things she had taken when she jumped off the roof.(or) Billy longs for the familiar after that night at Starcourt Mall.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 13
Kudos: 85





	Real is a Thing that Happens to You

He had never been fed by what is inherently sentimental. Even as a little boy, those precious creatures that lived on the highest shelf in his heart were easily destroyed or ripped away by the person he was becoming. Stuffed toys fell to pieces under the heat of his anger, the toxic potion that was brewing under the surface of his skin ate away at the rose-colored hue surrounding his childhood home to the point of absolute degradation. 

Billy doesn't remember a time when he longed for the sanctity of his bedroom. For the pale yellow sunlight streaming past blood stained Thomas the Train curtains, or the box of broken toys that Neil had left alone. He doesn't remember when it happened, when the flip switched and his longing went from missing Saturday morning cartoons in his parents bed to simply missing his mother and all the things she had taken when she jumped off the roof.

It wasn't always like that. Billy remembers something else. He remembers a blanket that smelled like cinnamon toast crunch, adorned with microscopic holes he liked to suck his thumb through. He remembers a set of roller blades the color of crushed mustard seeds; Neil taught him to skate. No one knows that, no one remembers, but Billy. Does, he. Remembers strong fingers laced with his own, holding tightly while Billy figured out how to maneuver the cracks in the sidewalk. 

Billy is haunted by a time when his fathers hands were good for other things. 

\--

Before Hawkins. Before that night when the demon punched a hole through his chest, Billy had been giving things away. To lighten the load, he supposes, that which had become unbearable.

First it was his skateboard. 

Max wanted it.

At the time he didn't think it was as simple as all that; his bitchy kid sister begging, day in and day out for access to the magic carpet that sat entombed in Billy's closet. He hadn't used it in years, ever a slave to the bright blue ocean, but it didn't matter. It was the principal of the thing, the skateboard to his kneecap.

Max took and took and took until Billy had nothing left to give. She said _you don't even use it anymore_ and Billy said _doesn't matter, you can't skate._

Neil told him it could be good for bonding.

Neil told him Max was a good kid, she deserved to have something of her own in their house on Willowbrook Avenue.

Neil told him to _hand it over before I stick it up your ass, kid._

So Billy ground his teeth together and tried to push down the aching emptiness at tossing away the last thing his grandmama had given him before she passed away. It was the principal of the thing--if Ruthann were still around she'd tell him to let the kid have it. Let her have something of her own, so. He polished its bearings and left it outside her bedroom door, pretended to read until she came knocking an hour later with confusion twisting her freckled face to shit.

 _You're sure I can have it._ She asked.

And.

 _Yeah._ _I'll teach you._

He wonders if Max remembers those afternoons in the driveway that morphed into weekends at the skatepark with Max scuffing up the wheels and Billy tapping into his thin line of patience. Wonders if she's plagued by the memory of hidden smiles and misplaced affection, because. Billy had thought it would hurt more, giving away a piece of his childhood like that, but. He had long since stopped attaching emotional worth to things that broke. Things that crumbled.

He wonders if Max remembers a time when his hands were good for other things.

\--

Billy made a habit of throwing away the things that weighed him down. 

The skateboard, the blanket that smelled like cereal milk, he thought all of it made him weak. The more shit he had that mattered to him the more he had to lose, so. Every Spring Billy would wrap his fingers around the mouth of a big black trash bag and lighten his load. Scoop armfuls of his childhood into the abyss that always, somehow, _incredibly_ operated as a portal to Max's room.

Sometimes he wondered if she even had a personality or if everything she had, everything she was, came directly from Billy's dumpster.

One man's trash, and all that. 

She wore his old shirts. Read his books, hung discarded posters of naked chick's on the insides of her closet doors for _some fucking reason,_ and. In a weird way Billy felt like maybe he was being immortalized. Every phase of his life was shone back at him like the surface of a lake, or a shiny new penny on the dashboard of the Camaro, and he felt good. Useful, for his trash becoming someone's gold. 

So Billy kept tossing things out.

Reorganizing and downsizing until his room looked like a generic movie set for a troubled teen. Every weekend Billy packed the little pieces of himself into neat trash bags, tying the lip closed and leaving them for max. Nestled at the foot of her door, like a bargain brand Christmas gift that was not at all what she had asked for. Gifts that came 52 times a year.

The bags always vanished. Billy felt heavy and light. Heavy and light. In the end he wasn't sad to see it go.

\--

Maybe it was just a side effect of growing up in the big, empty house on the hill and fighting the incessant need to fill it with shit but Steve Harrington was a packrat. The kid never got rid of anything. Before Starcourt. Before that night when the demon punched a hole through his chest, Billy would tease him about it.

_What, like you need five binders full of empty laminate pages?_

Steve's tongue would poke out of the corner of his mouth while his fingertips brushed the offended plastic. _I'm going to start scrapbooking._

And that was is usual way, to find an explanation, a inarguable reason for all the junk in his life, but.

Billy thought it was okay to have things around for comfort.

Wasn't really his style, but it was Steve's and Billy didn't stop the kid from collecting whatever he could get those slim fingers on. Old NATARI cartages, broken HAM radio antenna's, torn polaroid's, annual _Moms of Loch Nora Bake sale_ t-shirts; he kept everything in case an old timey push mower could prove itself to be useful.

Before that night when the demon punched a hole in his chest, Billy would smirk. _What sad sack wants a MILF's face on his chest?_

Steve just shrugged his shoulders. _Someone could need it._

And Billy just snorted, because.

Harrington's a weird guy.

Thoughtful and pretty and so, _so_ fucking weird.

When they brought Billy home from the hospital he slept in a shirt with Karen Wheelers face on it, every night for a week.

Funny how it all comes back around.

\--

He spends a lot of time in bed with the covers pulled up under his chin. Draped in Steve's ridiculous knit sweaters and thick woolen socks because everything is cold, now. As if winter has settled rough and desperate into the very marrow of his bones and even though the fabric rubs too harshly against the healing rise of his stitched skin, Billy can't shed even a single layer for fear of freezing to death.

That's what it had felt like Before Starcourt. Before the monster punched a hole through his chest, when it just had its fingers inside his skull.

Endless winter.

Steve buys every type of heated blanket on the market. Searches high and low for expensive down t-shirts that will _help you feel more comfortable,_ but. Billy doesn't even remember what that's supposed to feel like.

Steve says comfort feels like sleeping in on Saturday mornings because you don't have anywhere to be. Home sounds like your mother fixing pancakes just before lunch time but-- _oh._ Everyone always remembers half a second too late. Billy tries to smile, tries to accept the help Steve gives him--he wears the sweaters and keeps the socks on after his morning bath even though he's not really a sock person because Steve is so hopeful.

Bright.

Steve smiles over the mug of hot cocoa he fixes Billy every morning and hopes. _If we start the day warm, who knows?_

Billy doesn't have the heart to tell him.

\--

Steve spends a lot of time in bed. Plastered to Billy's skin--chest to back because Billy needs to feel like he's protecting something, after Starcourt. After that night when the demon punched a hole through his chest. 

Sometimes Billy feels like Maxine. 

Stealing bits and pieces from someone's garbage can. Here he is, sleeping in Steve's bed wearing Steve's clothes taking up such a large part of Steve's life, and.

Pretty Boy just snuggles closer and lends his warmth in more ways than one.

Billy doesn't always know how to handle it when those milky brown eyes watch him roll around under the covers until his body finally feels at peace. Every night Billy closes his eyes says the same thing. "I can be out of here by next week, if you--" Afraid to look for fear that he'll see relief reflected back at him.

Every night Steve says the same thing in return. "You're my whole world now, Billy." 

As if that's supposed to get the car back on track. As if Billy hasn't veered off the road and crashed into a tree every single day since--

"Maybe it would make you feel better if, you know." Steve shuffles impossibly closer, the hot line of him charring Billy's skin even through the layers of wool. "If you had something familiar."

"You're familiar."

Steve's flesh burns even hotter. Eyes shining even bright, at that. Something almost like love. "I meant something from your childhood."

Billy rolls onto his side.

Steve moves with him without even thinking about it--chest to back because Steve needs to feel useful, after Starcourt. After that night when Billy hit the floor and the light went out of his eyes. Billy's chest rises against the palm of Steve's hand, where it's pressed against him. Steve will never get tired of that motion.

"I don't have anything from my childhood."

Which. "Not even at home?"

"This is home now." Billy sounds like he doesn't want to talk about it, but.

Steve can't bring himself to care. Or maybe stop caring. "I meant at Neil's."

"Got rid of all that shit." He can hear the tremor in Steve's voice, when the boy finally finds it.

"Neil got rid of your--"

"No." Billy says simply. "I did."

He can hear the wheels turning in that beautiful head. Steve swallows, the movement palpable in the thick night air. "But. Don't you miss it?"

After a while Billy shakes his head in the darkness, curls catching on the plaid pillowcase. It takes Steve a moment to decipher what it means, how it makes him feel that Billy can so easily toss away the things that no longer serve him. 

They're quiet for a while. So long that Billy's breathing goes deep and even, a clear indicator that he's fallen asleep. Steve knows it won't last long, knows the nightmares wake him up, and.

Steve always stays awake through the first three to give Billy something familiar to hold onto.


End file.
